Turning Lead into Gold - the Alchemist Resurgence
For the first time since The International 3, Alchemist is getting attention from both professional and pub players. He is being picked or banned in almost 50% of all premium professional matches and his pub win rate has drastically gone up since the last patch. Today we would like to discuss what changes to the hero and metagame have made him viable once again and look over some of the most popular builds for the hero.
Reading the Changelogs
In the last two patches, the hero has received some very interesting buffs. One of the most influential ones was the Bounty Rune gold multiplier - getting extra 500 gold at 0:00 means you can either rush some core item or get your mid an early 
Bottle (or get a bottle yourself if you're mid).
Additionally, Acid Spray now deals 3/4/5/6 extra damage per level. While it might be insignificant in a teamfight, it has certainly increased the speed with which the hero can take stacks of neutral creeps.
Finally, there is an 
Aghanim's Scepter upgrade. It can serve multiple purposes - it is excellent at conserving item slots on allied heroes and can give your supports a very necessary boost. It is also amazing in the late game, where extra gold can actually translate into extra stats, even if the hero does not have an ultimate upgrade. I do not recall the self-usage of the item in pro games, however in pubs, which tend to be unnecessarily drawn out, it can certainly come in handy.
Core Build
Core 
Alchemist thrives on the same gold advantage as 
Anti-Mage does, probably to a higher degree. He does not need a fast 
Battle Fury to start flashfarming, making it possible for him to go for fighting items early on. Compared to Anti-Mage however, he doesn't scale as well and this should be taken into account.
The classic build for Alchemist involved getting an early 
Shadow Blade or 
Blink Dagger for initiation and a quick kill. It was generally followed by situational DPS/Survivability items. The advantage of this approach is how versatile it is. You start off with initiations tools that also help you accelerate your farm and then get whatever items you need against the particular lineup you are facing.
This versatility and gold advantage was the name of the game for core Alchemists during TI3 and it still works. Too much physical DPS on the enemy team? Assault Cuirass can solve this problem, as well as increasing your DPS. Need lockdown? Skull Basher/Abyssal Blade have got you covered. Facing evasion? Get Monkey King Bar. Best part is: with the amount of gold Alchemist earns, getting to these "response" items is fast and easy. Being one step ahead of the enemy not only in terms of Gold but in the way this Gold translates into the power level of the team is crucial for any hero, but especially for Alchemist.
Lately however, one build has gained so much popularity, it could even be considered the default build. I am talking, of course, of the 
Radiance, 
Boots of Travel, 
Manta Style and 
Octarine Core build. I would like to discuss this build in slightly more detail. You do not necessarily get items in the order discussed here though.
Radiance has received several buffs over the last couple of patches. Not only does it cost less now, but it also provides "miss" chance on the enemies affected, making Alchemist an excellent carrier for the item. With very low armor and HP scaling, Alchemists generally need survivability items to go into a big teamfight. One way to solve it is to initiate yourself and take out the priority target, but this method is prone to being counter-initiated on. Another method is to get a hybrid survivability/dps item - your HP regeneration makes up for dents in your health and restores burst magic damage dealt to you while some item makes sure you don't die to the following barrage of auto-attacks.
Until recently Asssault Cuirass was the answer, but the big problem with it is that you actually have to hit enemy to fully utilize the added DPS. Radiance works regardless - you are constantly dealing a considerable amount of damage (especially given how early Alchemist can get Radiance) and providing yourself and your teammates with extra survivability. What is equally as important is that it also speeds up your farm immensely and gives you 65 damage in case you need to stand and fight.
Manta Style is a very logical addition to the build, since it works wonders with Radiance. It increases you farm speed, your move speed, provides you with an extra source of damage and allows you to split-push very effectively. It provides you with an extra way of evading single-target spells on top of your ultimate and it is also a great stat item for Alchemist considering how desperately he needs armor. With 30 second cooldown on Melee heroes and decreased manacost in 6.85, it makes for a great item on Radiance Alchemist, especially with Octarine Core in mind.
Then there are Boots of Travel - an item which glues all of it together. Being able to constantly apply pressure and remain elusive will always be crucial for illusion split-push heroes, which Alchemist is slowly becoming. However there is more to it than meets the eye. One of the biggest side benefits of this build is that, given these items, you run at 522 MS under the effects of your ultimate. It allows you to chase extremely well and, even more importantly, makes you less kiteable - something melee carries have been suffering from for the longest time. Since this build does not prioritize lockdown, to stay effective it needs this extra movespeed, so that even if you are slowed you can still get close to the enemy or at least stay close enough for Radiance to deal damage.
Octarine Core is just a cherry on top of it all. It decreases downtime on your ultimate to 8.75 seconds and downtime on Manta Style to 2.5. It also greatly increases your survivability and survivability of your illusions with extra ability lifesteal. Finally, it decreases the cooldown on Boots of Travel to 34 seconds allowing you to becomes even more of a global nuisance.
What this build creates is a very fast-farming Alchemist who can fight well and still has two slots which are incredibly flexible. Introduction of 
Moon Shard essentially makes it three slots while Aghanim's Scepter can be considered very sub-optimal fourth. It provides high survivability, decent stats, amazing DPS, great Movement Speed and potentially up to 62 extra passive HP regeneration from Radiance+Octarine combo alone. These four slots as well as some extra items can be farmed by 30 minutes mark with ease - the time frame where Alchemist is generally at his peak.
There are countless VODs from Pro Players and Pub Stars alike on how to play the hero effectively. Most recently I was particularly impressed with this game:
With time Dota has become more and more efficient to a point where comparing coordination and game sense between TI1 and TI5 is almost laughable. This added efficiency demanded more efficient heroes - the current Alchemist playstyle is almost identical to core 
Naga Siren but with a much stronger and more reliable early game. Granted, Naga Siren is going to scale better with stronger (and more) illusiuons, better stat growth and high-impact ultimate, but can you really expect her to get 6-slotted 30 minutes into the game?
Support Alchemist
I have been theorycrafting support Alchemist for the longest of times. It is no surprise, since I am primarily a support player, but until recently it did not really click all together. In this case until recently = until the introduction of 
Solar Crest.
Solar Crest fits support Alchemist like a glove - if for a core one it is essentially a tempo item to be changed later on, losing gold in the process, support one can keep it for the whole game. It gives him incredible gank potential as well as survivability and rosh killing potential. More importantly, it synergises well with his other abilities, all of which deal physical damage. Finally, unlike other supports, Alchemist can get his hands on Solar Crest very early.
The item is especially good when played with 
Templar Assassin, since the damage from Psi-Blades is calculated based off the initial target's armor.
There are tons of other items Alchemist can get his hands on earlier than other supports. 
Glimmer Cape is a very situational pick up but even after the nerfs the item is amazing. 
Force Staff has never lost its relevance while Blink Dagger can be a great addition if your team lacks initiation.
Support Alchemist can sometimes even allow himself to get 
Hand of Midas to potentially become an extra core in the later stages of the game. As always - with Hand of Midas it is not about the gold (even though it is reliable) - it is about getting levels. The marginal benefit of Hand of Midas on Alchemist is lower than on other heroes when it comes to gold gain - something to keep in mind if you are playing core Alchemist.
Generally, Alchemist's mana pool does not allow him to go 
Mekansm, but it might be a good idea to get 
Guardian Greaves solving the problem of low mana pool and getting some heal for the team. Equally as important is the fact than you can dispel silences from yourself - it can and will come in handy against certain heroes and should ensure successful Unstable Concoction usage.
As you can see, in case of support Alchemist the versatility is really high - the only item I would consider core is Solar Crest. Everything else depends on the enemies you are facing and the items you are going for. 
Heaven's Halberd works wonders against ranged Auto-Attack carries, 
Silver Edge can be a great pick-up against heroes which rely on their passives, 
Lotus Orb is amazing at dispelling hexes from your allies and can add to the survivability of your teammates. 
Vladmir's Offering is a cheap alternative to Assault Cuirass, but sometimes the benefits from it can be even greater. What does a hero truly need? This is for you to decide!
Your general gameplan consists of:
Stacking Camps. You will not necessarily be taking them yourself but the added XP you can get from it is crucial.
Controlling Runes. Keep the bounty ones for yourself, save the "buff" rune for your mid player scaring away enemies.
Ganking. Unstable Concoction is a rather underrated spell with a cast range of 775! It can set up some easy ganks on enemy midlaner.
Applying Pressure on the Lane Enemy.Alchemist is notoriously bad at this. Trading hits with your starting armor is borderline suicidal and melee range certainly doesn't help. Acid Spray if used offensively pushes out the lane and the only way to apply pressure is through Unstable Concoction which has a long cooldown and a huge manacost.
There are only a couple of professional games where the hero was played in the support role, both by VP.fng. The games do not necessarily stand out and are inconclusive, but If you are interested in what exactly fng did you can check the game links here and here
Dealing with Alchemist
After all this praise and theorycarfting it is time to look how to counter the hero effectively. We will omit discussing 
Ancient Apparition since it is too case specific, but if your draft allows it, getting AA is amazing against Alchemist as it halves the effect of the Alchemists ultimate (he still hits with 1.0 BAT) and deals well with the Radiance+Octarine combo.
Alchemist in the middle lane is not necessarily the strongest adversary. It is easy to harass him out before he hits level 6 and he is generally just spamming Acid Spray and getting an occasional last hit. It is annoying to deal with a constant DoT (Alchemist usually gets Bottle early on), but otherwise should not pose much of a threat against an experienced player.
In the safe lane, Alchemist needs to be harassed as much as possible. He is an extremely weak laner, especially with extra points in greed, so he should not pose much of a threat. An early support rotation from the safe lane or even an aggressive trilane can do wonders. He will pull ahead, but not necessarily by much, if faced with constant harassment.
The bigger issue comes from the fact that on any team with at least some coordination, the neutral camps are going to be stacked. If for heroes like 
Storm Spirit and 
Shadow Fiend stacks were primarily used as means of catching up after somewhat weak laning stage (or to pull ahead further if the laning stage went well), for Alchemist it means lots and lots of gold and probably a big item.
Couple it with the fact that mid Alchemist is going to try and control the runes and you are looking at very early itemized aggression.
There are several ways of making the Greed have less of an impact. First of all - rune vision. You do not necessarily need to contest some of the "buff" runes against mid Alchemist - Alchemist with Double Damage and Haste is not really scary (compared to Templar Assassin for instance). But you need to absolutely make sure he does not get a creep wave worth of gold every two minutes. Supports should generally try to rotate to the river, sometimes even destroying the rune if they can't make it to it in time.
Additionally, you generally should keep check on the enemy jungle - having a ward that does not block the camp but provides vision can be an option - it will not be destroyed as easily (doesn't raise suspicion) and can give information for when you need to strike on a weakened camp/enemy.
These wards also serve a very important purpose - when Alchemist goes jungling you can never know what item he is going to purchase next. It can catch you off-guard with a Blink/Invisibility initiation and make you forfeit a lot of gold. Understanding Alchemist's current power level is very important - there are many different builds for the hero and you can never know how exactly you should itemize to counter him.
Finally, the most important piece of advise I can give is to never give up against Alchemist. The game might seem unwinnable at times, but the power level cap on the hero is rather low - even 1.0 BAT cant make him go face to face on equal ground with a similarly slotted proper carry in the late game. Additionally, his Net Worth is going to be terribly bloated - something that can be abused. Every kill on the hero and/or his teammates is going to give more gold and playing from a constant gold deficit does have its perks. Going for pick-offs, even on other heroes, can be extremely beneficial.
Good article.I've recently been playing this hero. You leave him for 20 minutes, you lose. As simple as that.
No one talks about how Phoenix pretty much eats Alchemist with sun rays with sustain for teamates.
"he doesn't scale as well and this should be taken into account."
Man, alchemist scale way better than anti mage...
IFG.PFInferno - what do you mean? Doesn't Dotabuff stats show Phoenix is weak against Alchemist?
An example of Alchemist using Aghanim's in a pro game>
PR vs Alliance, TI5 EU Qualifiers, Game 1. Where you see Alchemist giving an Aghanim's to Weaver near the end of the game.
Megan, I think he means in the sense of using it on himself rather than another player. Secret also used alch to farm aghs for other heroes recently
A good read as always :) . I like that someone other than myself has contemplated support Alchemist. The possibility that a tier 4 can maybe farm a carries ags (eg Qop, Lesh, Tiny etc.) makes the whole dynamic interesting. Additionally, a solar crest/Halberd can give him a bit of a Bristleback complex, where the hero cannot be ignored, yet isn't priority enough to be focused out. I love the prospect of creating space in a FIGHT, and i think a support Alchemist is perfect for those loose chaotic team fights.
Greevil's Greed is too overpowered. When others just got their boots and blink he has radiance. 5x Bounty is just bullshit.
The average alchemist averages 950 gold per minute what the fuck.
Alchemist is almost like a LoL champion in his current state. Overpowered for no reason at all stages of the game. Both of the buffs were totally unneccesary.
Hi there,
I think we missed out morphling ultimate which falls under below situation:
Same team: alche + morph
morph replicate alche and farm
normal gold gets to morph
greed's gold will pass through to alche passively
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/DotA2/comments/3plzw7/clone_enemy_alchemist_get_easy_gold/
in dealing with alchemist you do not touch on his low agility and armor. alchemist's agility growth is basically the same as clinkz's strength growth. He might appear tanky because of regen, but unless you go above and beyond in the hp pool, he's actually really squishy because his physical dmg resistance is extremely low. Anyone who builds a deso, if they get it fast enough, is going to be good against alchemist. Slardar is very good against alchemist. Heroes that remove armor are effective ways of dealing with him without being pigeonholed into picking aa every time you see an alchemist. If you build a deso on slardar, he's going to fall even faster than slardar normally kills heroes with a deso and ulti.
WHY SOMEONE WITH NORMAL SKILL BRACKET WROTE THESE STUFF ? LOL SUCH POOR UNDERSTANDING OF THE GAME AND APPARENTLY NO COMPETITIVE INSIGHT ABOUT THIS HERO AT ALL. WHAT ALCHEMIST KEEPS AN AGH ON HIM FOR STATS ? JESUS.
Socks I'm not sure you understand how Alchemist fares in a teamfight.
The damage from Radiance and Acid Spray alone is nearly enough to outweigh what most carries can bring to a teamfight -- Lone Druid for instance can't even begin to compare.
Alchemist's only real problem is lack of lockdown but that's what his team or basher/abyssal/mkb/concoction are there for.
Currently my my 4 games alche has a avg of 759 GPM (plus 1000+ GPM on one game). Except the one game abandoned (6.82), the 6.85 Alche is so OP. must be nerf
Goblins Greed: Must be activated before it works (like drow ranger). Bounty rune bonus always x5, but the creeps bonus does only .25% if not active. CD bout 30sec. When activated last bout 5-10sec
Chemical Rage: Health regen nerf from 50/75/100 to 50/65/80. Movement speed bonus nerf 30/40/60 to 30 on all level. Alche is now immune to his own Unstable Concoction when explode during Chemical Rage. When Goblins Greed is activated during the Chemical rage, grants +30 MS and a phase movement.
P.S. no hate pls. I'm not a pro, only 3.5k mmr range. Just my opinion.
Cytrynowy - In plain stats doesn't reflect support's effectiveness. With the popular alc build these days, the atk spd slow and the constant 5pct dmg /heal per sec creates a decent amount of sustain for your teamates to dish out dmg to survive in team clashes.
It's the same concept like Treant where the hero's team effectiveness doesn't reflect in stats because teamate sustain skills doesn't reflect as an assist via stats recording.
@DTS.ArtStyle
"WHY SOMEONE WITH NORMAL SKILL BRACKET WROTE THESE STUFF ? LOL SUCH POOR UNDERSTANDING OF THE GAME AND APPARENTLY NO COMPETITIVE INSIGHT ABOUT THIS HERO AT ALL. WHAT ALCHEMIST KEEPS AN AGH ON HIM FOR STATS ? JESUS."
Ether you misunderstand or misread what was meant. Alchemist is able to turn aghs into a buff (stats included) the scenario entails Alchemist building a aghs for himself (LATE game) purely as a 7th slot, 8th if he has moonshard.
I really don't get the ignorance/hate for Aghs. I'm willing to wager at least 6 significant games had Aghs upgrades. Off the top of my head, Secret twice gave Necro the upgrade (as did others). Alliance gave WD the upgrade to win against NIP in the mega-creeps game, and I can remember countless other upgrades given.
It's not remotely sub-optimal and it's pretty obvious that WD, Necro, Visage and other key upgrades are far more important than Moon Shard consumption. The quality of this article as a serious contribution seems very suspect if you haven't even seen the data that this has happened in pro games (which just looking at the stats could inform), let alone having watched those games, many of which were very prominent ones. It seems like the author has just internalized the "Aghs sucks" mentality without actually looking at any evidence
It seems like the reader has just internalized the "Writer sucks" mentality without actually looking at any evidence)
I think Aghs is sub-optimal when used as a slot on Alch himself - hence "can be considered very sub-optimal fourth." (the current popular build takes 4 slots, leaving two open. Moon shard can be considered 3rd free or 7th slot. Aghs on Alch can be considered 4th free or 8th slot) More or less what I meant. I don't think I've seen any pro player ever eat an Aghanims Scepter as Alchemist)
meh most alchemists i meet in the 4k bracket just go mid and feed and flame their team after they feed this hero is trash
:) When clock says 9:20 it a 10th minute
Otherwise how would you say for 0:20? In 0 minute?
So he scored a goal in 10th minute, he made the radiance in 10th minute :) come on use your brains humans
Well you did say "I do not recall the usage of the item in pro games, however in pubs, which tend to be unnecessarily drawn out, it can certainly come in handy"
There have been at least 10 instances of Aghs usage in pro games this patch (and I mean prominent games). Fair enough, on consuming it himself, but I still think you haven't paid any attention to either the practice or the logic in theory for giving Scepter to other teammates and at the point where you are devoting half a page to support Alchemists, Lotus Orbs and the like, that's a pretty significant omission.
I actually like when the opponent picks alch... I have only lost to it once this patch that I can recall. The hero is just not strong (he farms faster than anyone in the game no doubt, but he needs damage, attack speed, armor, HP, and mobility to be useful) and on top of that the people that play him tend to go ultra greedy, leaving their team to fight 4v5 and then when he does show up he just gets kited or bursted. If at 30 min you see a 6 slotted alch split pushiing or an AM split pushing with BF PT Vlads Manta, I am far more afraid of the AM.
KAWAII SOCKS WAS REFERRING TO AGHS BEING USED ON HIMSELF AS SUB OPTIMAL, THEY ARE NOT SAYING FEEDING AN AGHS TO YOUR WITCH DOCTOR/AA/VENO/UNDYING/MORPH ETC IS A BAD IDEA
Nah... alche is not overpowerd. he is soft like crystal maiden.
Lately many ppl know how to counter alche already.
used to be op at 1st coz no one know how to counter it.
now go try pick alche hahaha, and everyone will counter pick u!
Talking about counter; What is your top counter to Alch ? especialy mid.
Ran some 1v1 test with a friend. Alch Vs Viper, DK, Silencer, OD and Axe.
Alch zone out most heroes by spamming Acid cloud.
Viper: is meh, can cancel alch bottle with corosive skin in acid cloud but that's about it.
DK: its equal until late when he laught at Alch near 10 min mark. You can fight him in acid cloud.
Silencer: Curse of the silent spam is very annoying. About 60% less Acid spray can be cast.
OD: at lvl 5 OD zone out Alch completly. Too bad OD is out of the Meta right now but he's a very aggressive counter pick to alch. 3x stack of astral and Alch lose his mana bar completly.
Axe: Alch cant reach the creeps, Axe built in regen is nice to deal with acid.
Alch is kindda becoming a cancer for low level mmr. A lot of people get hooked to the hero because of the great accomplishment feeling you get when you see your GPM at the end of the game and pick him compulsively. Problem is the playstyle forced by alch:
1- (Your team) Much like Anti-Magi, Alch pickers tend to afk farming forever, sometimes not even helping to defend... Some also feel entitled to the jungle/runes and flame whoever uses them. Most alch pickers in the team kindda force the whole team to play that '4v5 during the whole game while I farm for the first 40 minutes'.
2- (Your team) Much like Nature Prophet, most alch pickers stick to their own personal subgames even at later stages. Even when farmed, all they will do is (farm... I mean) splitpush and never actually take part in a team fight.
3- (Their team) Alch, much like old ancients-farming Tinker heavily punishes passive playing and lack of team cooperation (pretty common things in low level pubs). As your teammates fight over buying wards and taking farm, a decent alch will be left unchecked for 20-30 minutes and suddenly show up completely overfarmed and cause that unevitable wave of desperation: 'gg, report team feeder, afk fountain nbs!'
TL;DR:
Current alch's current non-interactive and farm-intensive playstyle ends up being very very cancerous to the great majority low level pub matches, not mattering in what team he's picked. Not exactly trashtalking about the hero himself, though. I love the possibilities he provides.
To be fair the Alchemist is entitled to every rune and especially bounty runes -- he also can flash farm faster & yields higher benefits from said farm than any other character in the game, so he's also entitled to the jungle. Basically every damn creep he can kill on the map should be considered his.
So having a 4 man fight squad while Alchemist gets 3 core items & farms scepters for the rest of the team ; with the occasional TP in to fight... is a sound game plan.
Then again if you're in a shitfest bracket and people can't even last hit decently... you're fucked from the get go regardless of what you & others play.
And if you're looking for a mid hero to vs the Alchemist ; Brewmaster. You just prevent the poor yellow thing from farming at all. He's going to get the 1 in 5/10 last hits and sit safely under his tower as you proceed to control the lane as you see fit.
Lifestealer/AA are his overall best in game counters though. Just avoid having lifestealer and AA on the same team... it's counter productive.
My top counter to alch mid is TA, it's easy to deny a huge amount of creeps from him and cs under your tower. Your refraction also helps you tank the acid spray a lot. Once the TA is level 7 with phase boots, it's very easy for her to kill the alch, even if his ult is activated, since most alchemists don't get stun at all early.
drafting with good teammates i think alchemist cant be outscaled. sure he will be 6 slotted at some point before your carry and when your carry gets 6 slotted he totally beats alche. but alches itemprogression doesnt stop at 6. he can be 12 slotted. that is +5 aghs and +1 moonshard. i doubt your carry antimage can outscale aghs ong WDsupport and VenoSupport such as happend in Secret vs Someone.
the way to beat alchemist is to win the laningphase, gank alot and proceed to push towers, lower the farmspace on the map for him. ward both jungleentrys, mb ancients. a succesful gank on alche gives u a ton of gold due to his big NW as well described in the article.
Remember when they said alchemist is trash before,now look at him Kappa
@ Jesus Christ Ofcourse you think TA is good that's the only hero you play :D
mhmm i have not lost to a alchemist yet despite he running around 5min radiance he dies like a bitch
but anyway why has noone considered instant dagon 5 as startingitem and pengpeng by ~15min
I just fought against the alche with
BF , Silver Edge , AC and Abyssal built with shadow priest and omni in his team and that was A LOT stronger. even AA can't do shit
he joined the fight at min 20 with BF , Shadow Blade , AC and Basher. strong as fuck :)
Thanks for the article.
Lol all these "muh he's only normal skill" everybody's entitled to their own opinion
dude. alchemist can manhandle almost any carry late game. I've once gotten toe-to-toe with a similarly farmed anti-mage, even during the time when the hero was only 40% winrate... his chemical rage is an insane dps steroid... itemise him with mjolnirs and other hyperstone-based items and a solid damage item like daedalus and maybe a skadi for some extra meat and he could easily go one-on-one with almost anyone... when his ult is on cooldown though, it's a whole different story...
hmm, nice hero really balanced :D http://www.dotabuff.com/matches/1900041836 1,259 gpm :/ .
pls fix this pls wtf this hero min 7 radiance and he fight 800 hp heroes , rly balance ty valve
Between manta and octarine, after radiance and travel, which items do we need to prioritize / build first?
I prefer octarine, because HP boost stat & reduced CD :)
check my profile
I have a 11th winning streak on alch so far in this patch
Just kill him, he's so fucking easy to kill in the laning phase. Once you kill him kill him again, and again and again. He will be able to recover, but at that point the laning phase is already over and his team will be at a disadvantage. If you leave him free farm you can't be surprised if at 20 min he is 4 slotted ready to destroy your team
Nice article was an interesting read and all views were put across with great detail. Sad to see some people can't appreciate how well thought out this article actually was.
I had a 9 game winning streak with alch mid until I got a support storm in the 10th game -_-